Winter Olympics 2014, Day 8: USA sweeps ski slopestyle podium

Henrik Harlaut is a Swedish person with huge white Swedish person dreads, and an Olympian in slopestyle skiing.

For now, though, we don’t care about the whole skiing thing. We care about the fact that after his run, in the Olympics, he held up his hands in a W and yelled “WU-TANG IS FOR THE CHILDREN.”

The men’s short program took place on Thursday, with 30 figure skaters from 21 different countries competing for the gold medal. Each skater partook in their own routine in front of 13 judges. The event was a prelude to Friday’s free skating program, which, along with the short program on Thursday, will determine who earns a spot on the medal podium.

Heading into the competition, Canada’s Patrick Chan was seen as the favorite, with Japan’s Yuzuru Hanyu, Spain’s Javier Fernandez and Russia’s Yevgeny Plushenko, a four-time Olympic medalist, seen as his most likely challengers. Two Americans, Jeremy Abbott and Jason Brown, also competed in the event.

Whether it was nerves or adjusting to the big ice in a game situation, the Canadians looked awful for most of the first period, which somehow ended tied at zero with the shots nine for Canada, eight for Norway.

One of the focuses the Canadian coaching staff mentioned was to keep shifts short on the big ice, with many players averaging under 40 seconds, which could account for some of the lack of offensive punch as players were adjusting.

The round robin in Curling continued on Thursday and it was a disappointing game for Team USA in the men’s draw, where they were tasked with taking on Great Britain. The story was better on the women’s side, but the podium will not be possible.

The sixth session on the ice saw four games take place, including Team USA taking on Great Britain. It was a game the British controlled from the first end, forcing the American team to play catchup. They managed to reduce the gap to two stones in the seventh end, but saw that evaporate with another score by Britain in the eighth.

Henrik Harlaut of Sweden added an extra level of extreme to the Ski Slopestyle event on Thursday when he lost his pants mid-fight on his first run before crashing.

Crashing and losing your pants is bad enough, LANDING and losing your pants is slightly better -- which Harlaut did on his very next run.

Team USA exploded for six goals in the second period on the way to a 7-1 rout of Slovakia in the opening game for both teams in the 2014 Sochi Olympics.

The Americans were expected to boast one of the more explosive offensive attacks in the tournament and after a relatively quiet first period, the hype did not disappoint. Team USA led just 1-0 after the first 20 minutes in what was seemingly a bit of a feeling-out period for both teams before Slovakia answered to tie the game just 24 seconds into the second period.

The United States got a big boost to its medal count on Thursday morning.

Americans Joss Chirstensen, Gus Kenworthy and Nicholas Goepper were the top three finishers in the men’s slopestyle skiing, and the United States picked up three new medals in the process as well as its first non-snowboarding gold medal. Christensen won with a score of 95.80, while Kenworthy finished with a final score of 93.60 and Goepper had a 92.40 score.

Team USA started Thursday in Sochi with a bang by sweeping the podium in the first Olympic final of Men’s Ski Slopestyle.

It was believed all four Americans had a chance to medal in slopestyle, but the final order was slightly less predictable. Joss Christensen claimed gold with a score of 95.80 on his first run, the highest finish of his career -- eclipsing his sixth place finish in the 2014 X Games in Aspen. The 22-year-old skier saved his best for the brightest world stage; his win didn’t come down to one run, unlike other events at the Rosa Khutor Extreme park. Christensen claimed the competition throughout the day and his second run of 93.80 would have been enough to claim gold in its own right.

Playing in its first Olympic hockey game since 2002, Austria was on the losing end of an 8-4 dismantling at the hands of Finland.

Things started off so well for Austria, too.

In Canada, CBC live streams all hockey games. Find the stream to your game at Olympics.CBC.ca. Most games, including all Team Canada games, are on live television across Canada as well.

USA vs. Slovakia

7:30 a.m. ET / 4:30 p.m. in Sochi

TV: NBCSN (USA), TSN (Canada)

Live stream for American viewers here